Across the state of North Carolina, courts have been over-crowded, and therefore many defendants are experiencing extremely long wait times before cases are heard. Therefore, counties across the state have been implementing special DWI courts to process this influx of DWI cases. Two of the counties are Brunswick and Columbus County; however, this may be coming to an end soon.

DWI courts in North Carolina are funded by grants from the state, but these two counties have recently lost funding from the DWI courts, and they are scheduled to end on March 1. DWI cases will then be flooded into the normal court dockets, and people dealing with such cases are likely to experience lengthier wait times to have these cases heard. The counties who have lost funding have re-applied for the grant, but the problem is that, even if the state allows such grants to be re-established, it could take months for DWI courts to begin again.